Group wants to honor Kansas girl who convinced Lincoln to grow whiskers

A woman who is credited by historians with convincing Abraham Lincoln to grow whiskers - which helped him be elected as president - will be honored in Kansas this week.

Grace Bedell was 11 when she wrote Lincoln to encourage him to grow a beard because it would make him handsome. She later moved to Delphos, Kansas, in Ottawa County and lived there until she died in 1936.

Last March, a historian found a second letter from Bedell to Lincoln when she was older, asking for help getting a job.